NEED HELP! sps and algae problem

_AcroFreak_ · Aug 30, 2022

So I’ve been having some problems for a couple weeks with algae and my sps.
my tank was doing great before this. Great polyp extension on all corals. Color was good and my sps was growing fast then I started seeing some hair algae (I think it’s bryopsis) and some stringy algae on the back glass. my corals closed up and stopped growing.
I started dosing vibrant per the instructions with little to no improvement.
I then tried seachem pristine and my results were better but the algae eventually outcompeted it.
I just recently dosed fluconazole and things took a turn for the worst. Most of my sps is having tissue loss and losing color. All my corals are closed and not doing good. I don’t know what’s going on or what’s wrong.
here are my parameters

Calcium 500ppm
Alkalinity 11.2 DKH
Magnesium 1670ppm
Phosphate 0.04ppm
Nitrate 0.0ppm
Salinity 1.025
Water temp 77.5-78.8

_AcroFreak_ · Aug 30, 2022

Here are some before pictures

Dburr1014 · Aug 30, 2022

Your corals are staving for one.
High alk and low and zero nutrients are not good.

How your cuc?
Need lots of snails and manually remove daily or almost daily to start off.

Tamberav · Aug 30, 2022

Alk is too high for your low nutrients

Nitrate is 0 which is not good. Raise it.

PO4 is too low and could even be 0 due to test kit range. Raise it.

You dosed 3 different things which further messed up the tanks biological/bacterial balance of your tank.

You have dinoflagellates from the low nutrients and probably dosing all that stuff aided it.

You need to bring up nutrients (I dose straight PO4/Nitrate, there are a few brands for this), I would also personally run a lower alk in the future. Some people add UV, some people do black outs or lower lights, some dose peroxide, there are 100's of pages on fighting dino. Some buy a microscope to try and ID which form they have.

This will be an uphill battle. I will be honest, you will probably lose more corals as this isn't something you can cure overnight and if you have toxic dino, you may lose CUC as well.

Here is a megathread:

Dinoflagellates – Are You Tired Of Battling Altogether?

I don't know what percentage of folks had luck battling dinos with any of the methods in the old Dino thread but it's obviously a very low percentage, so I'd like refresh folks on the natural alternatives and lay out three areas of info: some of the factors that contribute to a dino outbreak...

www.reef2reef.com

thatmanMIKEson · Aug 30, 2022

Unfortunately it looks like dinos and a mix of algae and they're pretty bad I don't have great advice for that level of them, But proper nutrients along with stability will help, along with manual removal

LOVEROCK · Aug 30, 2022

I would say looks like ostrea Dino’s

MBruun · Aug 31, 2022

Vibrant will affect the nutrient balance and Fluconazole will have some effect on the microbiology. Both might impact the corals and I guess that is what you see

Dburr1014 · Aug 31, 2022

Stop with vibrant.
Pull out some of the Algae and post a pic of you can spread it out on a paper towel.
Bryopsis looks like a fern, hair doesn't.
Probably going to need a uv. Pull and dump from the display.

sixty_reefer · Aug 31, 2022

It seems like dinoflagellates, and a typical outcome to a system that has become limited in nutrients, best course of action is to raise phosphates to 0.08 to 0.1 and nitrates to 10 only use calcium nitrate or sodium nitrate for the nitrates

sculpin01 · Aug 31, 2022

Dose nitrate and phosphate. Target 5-10 for nitrate and 0.05 - 0.15 for phosphate. Get a microscope and look at your dinoflagellates. If you see little spinning lenticular cells, you have Ostreopsis. Treatment would be UV at night and activated carbon. I'd recommend joining "Mack's reef...Dinoflagellates support group!" if you're on Facebook as they are experts on treating dinoflagellates.